


from the old horror to the new

by savorvrymoment



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), Thor (Movies)
Genre: Abortion, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Intersex Loki (Marvel), M/M, Mating Cycles/In Heat, Not Avengers: Endgame (Movie) Compliant, Other, Post-Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie), Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Pregnancy, Sibling Incest
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-09-25
Updated: 2019-10-19
Packaged: 2020-10-27 20:54:00
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 10,851
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20766803
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/savorvrymoment/pseuds/savorvrymoment
Summary: Thor barks a laugh, and then says the words he’s said so many times before, “I thought you dead.”“I was.  But Valhalla would not take me, and the denizens of Hel feared me,” Loki answers, quirking his lips at his own jest.  Thor rolls his eyes, but then Loki adds in seriousness, “Brother, these past years have been indescribably horrid for me.  And I am so very tired.”“Horrid foryou?  Youare tired?” Thor counters, incredulous.  “Do not speak to me of…”“I am trying to be honest with you!” Loki squalls, interrupting.  His hands shake when he grabs at Thor.And perhaps Thor should know better by now...





	1. Part 1

**Author's Note:**

> Just a quick note: I had this outlined and started well before Endgame was ever released, but then I ended up just sitting on it for a while. Now I'm ready to finish it but... It's not exactly Endgame compliant because certain characters are still alive. There are no spoilers for anything that went down in Endgame. For all intents and purposes, we can just assume the snap was reversed, no one died, and everyone lived happily ever after. Yay! :)
> 
> About 4 parts total planned out for this, but I tend to run long so... We'll see. Hope you enjoy!

It’s the middle of the night when Loki returns.

Thor wakes in his cabin, bleary eyes opening to find Loki crawling into bed alongside him. His brother’s skin is burning hot when Thor touches his face, his eyes intensely bright even in the dark of night. Thor can feel heavy puffs of breath against his hand when Loki pushes against him.

His brother is obviously cycling, aching in his fertility. Thor breathes out and says, “You’re alive.”

“Thor,” Loki murmurs, a nonsensical reply, and presses closer.

Thor sighs, looking up at the ceiling. “You come back to me now, like this,” he says. “Will you still be here in a few days’ time? Once you’ve been satisfied?”

Loki pulls away at that, sitting with his legs curled next to him, peering down at Thor. His expression is shuttered, his tone flat when he speaks. “You wound me, Brother.”

Thor barks a laugh, and then says the words he’s said so many times before, “I thought you dead.”

“I was. But Valhalla would not take me, and the denizens of Hel feared me,” Loki answers, quirking his lips at his own jest. Thor rolls his eyes, but then Loki adds in seriousness, “Brother, these past years have been indescribably horrid for me. And I am so very _tired_.”

“Horrid for _you?_ _You_ are tired?” Thor counters, incredulous. “Do not speak to me of…”

“I am trying to be honest with you!” Loki squalls, interrupting. His hands shake when he grabs at Thor.

And perhaps Thor should know better by now. But the words still silence him.

“We were once brothers. Friends,” Loki says, and Thor doesn’t point out that they still are brothers. That they always will be. He stays silent and lets Loki speak. “Perhaps I lived in your shadow. Perhaps you made me angry. You _still_ anger me. But you were always there for me. Always. And I was a fool…”

“We were both fools,” Thor allows.

“If I could go back and change things…” Loki adds, letting Thor pull him closer again.

“You regret?” Thor asks.

“Brother, I regret everything,” Loki says, his breath warm where his lips settle against Thor’s cheek.

Thor’s hands fall to Loki’s waist as his brother moves to straddle him. He can feel Loki’s hard cock against his belly, knows his cunny is probably soaking between his legs. Their lips meet in a long passionate kiss while Thor’s hands wander south, slipping easily under the waistband of Loki’s leggings.

“And if you speak to me of this conversation in the morning,” Loki breaks away long enough to add, “I will slit your throat.”

Thor just huffs a laugh in reply.

~*~

Thor dreams of his brother struggling, thin legs kicking out and elegant hands scrabbling at the chokehold around his neck. He dreams of his brother gasping for breath, of blue lips and already pale skin going white. He dreams of the crack and snap of his brother’s neck being broken. 

He jolts awake with wide eyes, sucking in desperate lungfuls of air, his body covered in a cold sweat. This nightmare is an old one, though it’s been some time since it’s visited him. He’s done his best to press forward after his brother’s supposed death, to let go and move on—for the third time now. Though here Loki has slithered his way back again, much to Thor’s simultaneous joy and despair.

He reaches for the other side of the bed, ready to gather Loki into his arms and comfort himself. To find reassurance in that fact that his brother has returned; that Loki is still here, has been at the cabin for three days and three nights now. Except when Thor rolls over, he finds cold and empty sheets instead of his brother’s lithe body.

His heart twists and breaks apart, and he squeezes his eyes closed. He should have known; he should never have expected Loki to actually stay. His brother is the Trickster, the Prince of Lies. He never should have believed a word Loki said.

But then he opens his eyes a moment later and sees a faint, flickering light from outside the open bedroom door. A candle is burning in the sitting room, a candle that neither he nor Loki left the night before. 

Not daring to hope, Thor stands from the bed and walks quietly to the bedroom door.

Loki is tucked into the corner of an armchair, legs crossed and thrown over the armrest. He’s in a dressing gown that Thor is sure he’s magicked onto himself, a silky dark green number that’s tied about his waist and open at his chest. He’s busy reading a book from Thor’s meager collection, the candle floating at his shoulder to cast light on the pages.

Thor stands in the doorway for quite a while and just watches, an easy affection curling its way through his chest. Loki is still here, all bookish and clever, looking strangely gentle in his nightclothes, softly backlit by the candlelight. 

When Loki finally speaks, he doesn’t bother looking up from the pages of his book. “Do you not own a dressing gown? Or do you just wish to flaunt your manhood about?”

Thor laughs, looking down at himself; he’s nude, having not bothered to dress himself when he’d climbed from the bed. “You were quite fond of my manhood a few hours ago,” Thor points out. “I thought you might like to see it again.”

Loki looks up from the pages at that, fixing Thor with a nonplussed sneer. “Do not get too cocky, Brother.”

Thor grins. “Really, Loki? _Cocky_?” Thor asks. “You’re losing your touch with words.”

Loki rolls his eyes, then flicks his wrist in Thor’s direction. Thor suddenly finds himself in a dressing gown identical to Loki’s, save for its dark burgundy color. The fabric is luxurious, silky soft against Thor’s skin, and he smiles as he runs his hand down the opposite arm. 

Loki speaks up again, “There is tea on the stove, if you like.” He gestures to his own teacup set on the coffee table. Loki adds, “I’ll warm it if it’s gone cold—bring it here.”

Thor stares for a moment longer as Loki goes back to his book before he moves off to the kitchen. The pot is no longer hot, so Thor grabs a mug from the cabinet and the pot off the stove before meandering back to the sitting room. 

Loki glances up when he returns, flicking his wrist again to send the pot steaming in Thor’s hand. Thor holds it away from himself as he fills his cup, then refills Loki’s cup when his brother holds it out expectantly. 

“Couldn’t sleep?” Thor asks, settling down in the armchair across from Loki. He leaves the hot teapot on the coffee table as he goes, which Loki scoffs at. A potholder mysteriously appears underneath it. 

“No,” Loki answers, “Stomach pains.”

Thor frowns. His brother does not look to be still suffering his fertile time. There is no flush to his cheeks, no sweat at his temple, no agitated fidget in his pose. Still… “If you were in need of me,” Thor says, “you should have woken me.”

Loki huffs in amusement, taking a sip of his tea. “Must I repeat myself?” he says. “Do _not_ get cocky.”

Thor smirks, and Loki grins. Thor is oddly reminded of times in their youth, sitting by the fire late in the night, trading lighthearted barbs and sniggering over each other’s jests. 

“You could not sleep, either,” Loki notes, closing his book and setting it aside.

“Night terrors,” Thor says. 

“Mmm,” Loki hums. “I am intimate with those.”

Thor closes his eyes before confessing, “I dream of many deaths. At times I hear the crack of your neck being broken—it is with such clarity.”

Loki is silent for several long moments before he murmurs, “And I dream of that blade through my chest. And that hold on my mind. And that gauntlet around my throat…”

Thor takes a deep breath, keeping his eyes closed. He’s not sure he will be able to control his emotions if he looks at Loki, and Loki is not one for tears. “You were truly dead?” he asks.

“I told you not to speak of that conversation,” Loki hisses.

“I’m not. I asked a question,” Thor counters.

Loki sighs, before relenting, “Yes, I have walked amongst the dead.”

“And you would not lie to me. Not after everything,” Thor says, finally meeting Loki’s gaze. There are dark circles under his brother’s eyes. His expression is unreadable. 

“No, Brother,” Loki says. “I would not lie about this.”

While it’s not a promise of complete honesty, it’s still something. Thor takes it with a smile.

Loki watches him for a moment before picking his book back up and flipping it open. “Finish your tea,” he orders. “Then we can lie together again before I bleed.”

And well, who is Thor to argue with that?

~*~

Thor is careful.

The fishing town he has settled in is small, its citizens long since aware of Thor’s presence amongst them. Thor fears that Loki will be noticed, and that action will be taken accordingly. His brother has left a trail of blood across Midgard in years past. People remember.

Loki is careful as well—at least for the most part. He stays on the cabin’s property a lot, lounging about in true royal fashion. He reads and writes, tends to his herb garden, and weaves his illusions through the interior of the cabin. He cooks for them while lamenting that there are no servants to do so, and while also lamenting that Thor’s cooking always tastes like mealworms.

“And you’ve eaten many mealworms, Brother?” Thor asks over supper one night, grinning. He finds his next bite to be a mouthful of wiggling insects, and he coughs and spits while Loki looks on with a smirk.

When Loki does venture out, he doesn't go as himself. Thor usually sees him about as a slight young woman, not conventionally attractive by this era’s standards but still somehow striking. Pale and petite, small-breasted with a stick figure, dark hair and light eyes.

Thor wonders how no one else recognizes him. When Loki accompanies Thor as the woman, all Thor sees is his brother. It’s everything he can do to _not_ inadvertently speak his brother’s name in public; to not call out _Brother_ to get the other’s attention, to not call out _Loki_ to make sure he’s still there.

The rumors and pictures crop up within the first month. For a sleepy little town, the inhabitants are sure busy with their Instagrams and Twitters. Thor still gets selfie requests regularly even in the coastal town, and he’s always happy to oblige, glad that the Midgardians still seem fond of him. Now, though, half of the photos seem to catch his brother—or sister?—lingering in the background, looking somewhere between exasperated and bored.

Other cellphone pictures begin to pop up as well. Candid photos that Thor has not noticed being taken; though in most of them Loki is scowling in the direction of the camera. There are photos of him and Loki in the local grocer, of him and Loki purchasing fresh fish at the market, of him and Loki ordering coffee at their favored café…

Photos of Loki piling Thor’s arms full of tomes in the bookstore, of them both walking along the stony shoreline, of them passionately arguing on the sidewalk with their faces inches apart…

Of course, every tabloid and gossip column assumes the woman is Thor’s new girlfriend. 

And how wrong and how right they are.

“So, who’s your new little lady?” Tony asks eventually. They’re in the Quinjet on the way back from a mission, Natasha at the controls with Clint and Tony seated in the back across from Thor. 

“Hmm? You mean Miss Lydia?” Thor replies, sadly proud of how easy the lie and false innocence comes across. He’s learned well from Loki.

“Lydia,” Tony says, trying out the name on his tongue. “Thor and Lydia.”

“I like that photo where she’s about to kill you in the middle of the street,” Clint puts in, grinning. “That’s true love.”

Tony laughs, nodding sagely. “The madder they get, the more they care.”

Thor frowns, not quite sure he understands, but then Natasha speaks up…

“She looks a lot like your brother.”

Thor’s heart stops and his stomach flips. By some miracle, he manages to raise his eyebrows in an appropriate response and not begin inanely sputtering.

“That’s sick,” Clint speaks up finally.

“Yeah,” Tony agrees. “That’s some first-class fuckery, Tash…”

Natasha shrugs, not looking back from the pilot’s seat. “I just noticed,” she says. “I mean, Oedipus Complex is real…”

“Well, that’s a lot to unpack, right there,” Tony interrupts.

“It is alright. It is not the first time I’ve been accused of such. I have thick skin,” Thor says, and gives a fake smile. “But my brother lies amongst the dead. Please let his name rest in peace.”

There’s a heavy silence, then. Eventually, Natasha says, “I’m sorry, Thor.”

Thor just nods in acknowledgment, and wonders if she genuinely suspects. Either that they share affections brothers should not, or that Loki lives again.

That night while Loki cooks dinner, Thor thinks about what he’d said. _But my brother lies amongst the dead. Please let his name rest in peace. _He stares at his brother, alive and well and stirring a pot of stew on the stove. And he steps into the kitchen to help with dinner, wanting to be closer to his brother’s side.

Loki slaps at him, and cries, “Mealworms, Thor! _Mealworms_!”

Thor laughs, unspeakably happy, and wraps his arms around Loki from behind to pull him into a hug. 

Loki harrumphs at the gesture, acting very put-upon, but he doesn’t pull away.

~*~

About a year had passed since Loki's fall from the Bifrost when Thor finally put two-and-two together and got a respectable four. And he could practically hear Loki laughing at him, calling him a dumb oaf, even though they’d already lit the fires and sent an empty vessel sailing across the waters.

Loki had probably figured it out during all of his warring and fighting and scheming. A fleeting thought of, _Oh, it’s because I am not biologically Aesir_, before he'd moved on to bigger things.

Thor found the book in a library on Muspellsheim. A strange place for the information, Thor thought—he'd searched the great libraries of Vanaheim and Alfsheim first, but found little information on the Jӧtnar. But then he read the book from Muspellsheim, and he learned of the similarities between the two species; one born of fire and one born of ice. Their physiologies were built for the extremes, opposite sides of the same coin.

The tome described both the fire giants and frost giants as monosex. Like Loki. And it described both species as cycling with the moons. Like Loki. It detailed their cycles as ‘sacred times’ for the giantesses, where they were given the ‘honor’ of bearing the fruit of their husband’s seed. Audacious words, Thor thought. He could only imagine Sif’s reaction to the sentiment; she would remove the offender’s manhood for such an insult. 

He wondered what made for a giantess rather than a giant, if they were all crafted the same as Loki. He had a strange feeling it was a social designation, though perhaps that was presumptuous. It may simply have been a preference.

Thor turned the page to find the symptoms of their estrus listed. For the fire giantesses: stomach cramps and a feeling of emptiness, touch starvation and desperation, agitation and anxiety, spontaneous arousal, increased hunger and thirst, fatigue, and hypothermia.

The same symptoms were listed for the Jӧtnar, except the last symptom was fever as opposed to hypothermia.

It was like reading about Loki—his brother hugging his aching belly, legs spread wide with his cock hard and cunny wet. Begging Thor with whining desperation, _Please, I need it, I need you inside me, take me, please…_ Sighing in relief when Thor finally penetrated him, moaning in pleasure when Thor stroked his thumbs across his cheeks. 

And Loki had always been squirrely during the day during lessons and meetings, constantly fidgeting and sweaty with the fever. And he’d been famished at breakfast and dinner, then still wanted snacks and drinks in the evening between their frenzied fucking. 

And gods, he’d always become exhausted after their first several couplings. His eyes would drift closed and his body would go lax in fatigue, even as he continued to beg Thor for more in sleepy undertones. Thor had always assumed it was from the physical exertion, but he should have known better. Loki had always been in excellent shape.

The book noted that the cycles were a way of ensuring the giants’ offspring were born during the milder months, ensuring that the newborns would develop some amount of strength before the harshest climates fell. Both the fire giants and frost giants carried for 12-months, and subsequently, they only cycled during times when the temperature was mild. For the fire giants, when the weather was coolest—during the fall and winter. And for the Jotnar, when the weather was warmest—during the spring and summer.

Of course, Asgard was always warm and mild. It must have confused Loki’s physiology, his body taking it to mean that it was always a good time to bear a child. And so he'd just continuously cycled. Every three moons. Like clockwork.

It occurred to Thor only then. The entire purpose of the moon cycles was fertility and conception. And how many times had Thor lain with Loki during those times? His own brother—perhaps not flesh and blood, but they hadn’t known that then...

Years later, Thor still wonders if his seed ever took. He wants to think Loki would have come to him with something that significant, though he also wonders if he’d ever actually known his brother at all. Wonders if Loki had only ever been made of smoke and mirrors. 

And in his heart, he fears that if Loki had ever been with child, he would have quietly taken care of it without saying a word. An incestuous royal bastard, inbred as far as Loki had known; that was not something that needed to be spoken about.

Though that knowledge, that it’d had to be done, would have done little to relieve the pain of terminating a pregnancy. And knowing his brother, the shame of it would have been just as crippling as the inherent loss. And the fact that his brother, for whatever reason, had felt he couldn’t come to Thor for support and comfort? It breaks Thor’s heart.

And now? It breaks Thor’s heart to think about all this and know that they were never of the same blood. Yes, their actions were degenerate and wicked, but any babe born from their relations would have been healthy and whole.

But then again, Loki had always bled after. Thor remembers signs of it in their shared bathroom; clean rags folded neatly by the toilet, the scent of menstrual blood lingering after Loki had bathed or relieved himself. So perhaps he’d used his magic to keep himself from falling pregnant. 

At that time, though, Thor had only been able to make assumptions and educate himself. It'd been far too late to take action.

His chest had ached from loss.

~*~

They sleep in the same bed in their Swedish cabin, Thor sprawled out on his back while Loki curls up on his side. Loki always begins the night with his back to Thor, but will often turn in his sleep. On nights that Thor is gripped with terrors and insomnia, he’ll sometimes watch his brother sleep; the lines of worry and stress ease from Loki’s face in his slumber, reminding Thor of so many centuries ago.

They don’t have sex, not during the normal days and nights in their life. That is reserved only for when Loki’s body demands it. For his cycle, or his time—Thor can never decide what to call it. It’s as reliable as the sun rising in the east, though. Every three moons, for four of five days, Loki falls prey to the fever and sweats and aching desperation of his Jӧtnar physiology. 

After his cycle is over and Loki starts to bleed, they try to carry on like nothing ever happened. Thor has only ever once tried to speak to him about it. They’d still been teenagers, and Loki had thrust a knife between Thor’s ribs to end the conversation. And so Thor’s never brought up their proclivities again; at least not outside the bedroom, not when Loki’s uninterested.

But like a good brother, Thor always takes care of him.

Or perhaps, Thor takes care of him like the wicked brother he actually is…

It’s not right. Thor knew that from the beginning. Loki was the Midgardian equivalent of thirteen-years-old, standing in Thor’s room with sweat on his brow and a tent in his breeches, embarrassedly trying to explain. _I don’t feel well. Something’s not right. It won’t go away._

Of course, they hadn’t known back then, hadn’t known about Loki’s origins. And even if they had, it’s not as though either of them knew about Jӧtnar anatomy and sexual function, about the purpose of the fertile times. All Thor _did_ know was that Loki was in pain and sick and scared. And he could still hear his little brother crying even after Loki had locked himself away in their private washroom.

So Thor had banged on the washroom door until Loki let him in, and things had devolved from there.

After that first time, Loki had stared at Thor like he didn’t even know him, and Thor had dissolved into tears as he tried to justify it all. _Loki needed me. Loki had begged me to. I’d do anything for Loki, even this…_

_Loki even has a cunt. Why would he have a cunt if we weren’t supposed to…?_

It wasn’t the first time Thor had seen his brother nude. Loki was never allowed servants in the bath or in his changing rooms, but Thor had always been allowed in with him. And Thor has memories of swimming bare-bottomed together in the nearby lake, young enough that Frigga still accompanied them, her watchful eye on Loki’s clumsy paddling. 

Loki’s body is an old, comfortable understanding. Thor cannot honestly remember a time when he didn’t know what his brother looked like; cannot remember a time when he didn’t know his brother had a cock and a cunt, or when he didn’t know his brother’s stones were hidden inside his pelvis. He assumes Frigga must have explained things to him at some point in time, but he doesn’t remember any particular conversation or moment of revelation.

And the fact Frigga had obviously known about Loki’s anatomy; that Frigga and Odin had _both_ known. Had they ever even spoken to Loki about it and let him ask questions? How had they explained his additional female genitalia when he was supposed to be a _Prince_ of Asgard?

Thor can remember getting the sex talk from their mother, but what in the Nine Realms could she have said to Loki? Had she even known about the Jӧtunn fertility cycle? In her wildest dreams, had she ever thought her baby boy would go crawling to Thor in desperation?

Gods, Heimdall had seen everything...

~*~

Thor sort of hopes that with the winters in Sweden being what they are, that maybe Loki won’t cycle come January. It’s not that he keeps track of the time, not really, not to the day; but Loki had come back to him in July, had cycled again as expected in October, and now…

It’s snowing outside when Thor wakes up to Loki draped overtop him. His brother’s body is hotter than any warmed blanket, and there are lips busy against his ear, panted breaths against his skin. He can feel Loki’s cock against his hip, hard and full.

Thor lays a hand against the small of Loki’s back, gently rubbing overtop of his nightclothes. His first instincts here are to soothe and care for—always have been and probably always will be, even with everything else that has passed between them. If he’s honest with himself, it’s the reason he hadn’t turned Loki away months ago, that first night he’d returned. One look into Loki’s lust-drunk eyes is all it takes to break him.

Loki trembles when Thor eases his hand underneath fabric to touch fevered skin. A breathy sigh escapes parted lips, and so Thor pulls him closer, manhandles him until he’s astraddle Thor’s hips. Loki stares, eyes a brilliant color in the early dawn light, and grabs at Thor’s chest. He mindlessly squeezes like he has his hands on two tits, and Thor laughs, giving his little ass a soft slap. 

“I had hoped,” Thor begins, letting his hands linger on Loki’s buttocks. “I had hoped since the winters are cold here, that perhaps this wouldn’t happen.”

Loki’s hands stop, his breath still coming hard, before he reels back. He rises from the bed in a huff, though the scowl pasted across his face is somewhat undercut by the way he is visibly shaking. His sleep shirt is hanging off of one shoulder, and his silk trousers are tented in the front. “Pardon me, Brother,” he says, tone biting. “I won’t inconvenience you any further.”

“That is not… No!” Thor says, reaching out. He grabs Loki by the wrist, only for Loki to twist out of his grip with a violent shout. So he reaches out again, grabs him again, and explains, “I meant that I’d hoped you might have a reprieve. This cannot be easy for you.”

Those words stop Loki’s struggling, and his face moves through a rapid series of expressions before he manages to school his features back into submission. He slowly climbs back into the bed, even lets himself be dragged back into Thor’s lap, and though he says nothing in reply, his silence is answer enough in itself.

Thor pushes himself up to lean against the headboard, pulling Loki along with him, then strokes his thumbs across Loki’s sharp cheekbones. Green eyes flutter shut, and Loki ducks his head, absolutely luxuriating in the simple touch. Thor swallows, and asks, “Do you need anything, before…? Are you thirsty? Hungry? We have…”

“Fuck me,” Loki interrupts, though it’s quiet, a request not a demand. He doesn’t open his eyes when he speaks.

So Thor yanks his brother’s pants down, wrestling them off his hips and down his legs. He doesn’t get a chance to do much beyond that. With his pants still caught on one foot, Loki reaches between them and pulls Thor’s half-hard cock from his underwear. He gives Thor a few proprietary pulls, getting him fully erect before sinking down without further comment.

Physically, it feels the same as always. Loki’s hands are everywhere, touching Thor’s face and chest and stomach, sometimes gentle and sometimes rough. And he is soaking wet, messy with it, the _slap-slap_ sound of their skin meeting intermixed with the _squelching _of Thor’s cock in all that slickness. It should probably be disgusting, but in the heat of the moment, Thor loves that sound as much as he loves the gasps and moans that leave Loki’s lips. 

Loki always cries out when he comes, it’s as though he can’t help it; and the clench and flutter of his cunny during orgasm is so intense, the sensation alone usually pulls Thor over the edge along with him. But even if it doesn’t, the image of Loki coming undone—his shaking body hunched over, face screwed up in agonized pleasure, cock spurting across Thor’s belly—Thor can never hang on while watching that.

He’s embarrassed to admit it, but his own brother is one of the best lovers he’s ever taken to bed.

(If he’s going to be completely honest with himself, Loki is _the_ best lover he’s ever taken to bed. But he’s not quite ready to examine what that means.)

After, during the fifteen minutes that Loki is temporarily is sated, while they are eating a quick breakfast naked in bed, Loki asks, “You thought I would not go into estrus because it was winter? _Really_?”

_Go into estrus._ It’s the first time Thor’s heard his brother actually say those words. “I read a book about…” Thor begins to explain, but Loki interrupts him with a laugh.

“And you thought Sweden’s winter would be remotely the same as Jӧtunheim’s winter?” Loki asks. He’s sitting with his legs curled underneath him, sipping at a glass of juice. Thor can’t help the way his gaze keeps raking over his brother’s body. He sometimes forgets in the day-to-day of life just how beautiful Loki is.

“I’d hoped,” Thor admits.

Loki sighs and rolls his eyes, but he doesn’t verbally berate Thor’s intelligence. Thor watches silently as Loki finishes his juice, then sets the empty cup on the bedside table. Then Loki says, “So, my brother read a book.”

He’s smirking as he says it, though Thor can recognize the statement for what it is. A question disguised as a lighthearted barb. So he gives Loki a playful shove in retaliation, before explaining, “I went searching for information after I discovered your parentage… after you fell from the Bifrost.”

“Thought you might find an explanation for my insanity?” Loki presses.

“No. But I had questions,” Thor says.

“Questions,” Loki parrots. “So you went looking for an explanation for my insatiability.”

“That is not—no. You are putting words in my mouth,” Thor says. He sighs, pinching the bridge of his nose, before trying to explain, “We were raised together. You stood by my side for so many, many years. You were my family—are my family, the only family I have left—yet…”

He trails off, trying to gather his thoughts and find the right words so he won’t continue to ramble. Loki watches him silently, waiting, hands fidgeting in his lap.

“You do know that they’d told me the same things,” Thor says. “I was told that you were my brother by blood; that the throne was yours by right should anything happen to me. But I return to find it has all been a ploy. I had so many questions, Loki, questions I wanted to ask _you_. But you were lost to me—at least then, you were.”

Loki looks at him for a long, silent moment. His eyes catch the sunlight coming in from the window, making them shine like emeralds. “I’d wondered if you had known,” Loki says eventually. “But then I decided not. You were never that subtle.”

Thor huffs a laugh, then says, “I should have realized something was amiss. Looking back, there is so much…”

“Let me tell you something,” Loki interrupts, crawling over to lean against Thor. He speaks quiet against Thor’s lips.

“Of course.”

“I don’t look back. I am trying to forget,” Loki says. “Because the more I dwell on it, the horror of myself becomes that much harder to bear.”

“Loki…” Thor murmurs, heartbroken, but Loki silences any further comment with a deep kiss. And as Thor rolls Loki over onto his back and spreads his legs, he can’t decide whether he’s helping his brother forget…

Or simply retelling their oldest tale of horrors. 


	2. Chapter 2

In the six months since Loki has returned, he and Thor haven’t spoken. Not truly, not in any real or significant sort of way.

They are companionable, and Thor is so grateful for that. It would be difficult to have his brother back and not be able to smile with him, laugh with him, share the mundanities of life. Loki is a comforting presence in Thor’s home, a reminder that Thor is not as alone as he’d thought. He still has family, still has his brother; he has adored Loki since he first laid eyes on him, a squirming babe in their mother’s arms.

At times, Thor sees glimpses of the brother he knew when they were younger. Cunning and coy, poised and brazen. Out of the corner of his eye, Thor will see the young prince once destined to be King’s Advisor; he’s dressed in fine leathers, his horned crown atop his head, standing tall and confident in his own royalty.

But then Thor will look again and see his brother as he is now, aged beyond his years and looking softer than any criminal should. Inside the cabin, Loki lounges in loose tunics and dark leggings, casual Asgardian styles. Loki assumes the Midgardian style when he shapeshifts into a woman to leave the cabin; he prefers flowing dresses and peasant skirts, only bundling up in the freezing winter weather for appearances. 

Thor knows he doesn’t need the sweaters and coats. When the first snow of the season fell, Loki had stepped outside clothed only in only his dressing gown to breathe in the crisp icy air. Thor had brought Loki a cup of hot coffee once it was clear he wasn’t coming inside, then left Loki standing barefoot in the sleet for the rest of the morning. The snow was melting in Loki’s hair when he'd finally stepped back inside, and there was a look of peaceful serenity in his eyes. Thor still wonders if that had been the first time Loki had ever allowed himself to enjoy something so simple, something he'd felt he wasn’t supposed to. 

The cold calls to him, surely always has, but Loki never understood why.

Then again, Loki had grown up not understanding most things about himself.

Thor sees cracks in his brother’s mask sometimes—thrashing and screaming in the night, moments when Loki stares into the distance at something Thor cannot see, times early in the morning and late at night when Thor swears he sees tears hanging in the corners of emerald green eyes. Moments of pain so extreme Thor is unsure how Loki is not drowning it in. 

Though whenever Thor tries to speak to him about it, about _anything_ that’s happened in their recent past, Loki shuts down faster than Thor can blink. 

There is so much Thor wants to say to him. He’s already said he is sorry for any and all wrongs he committed, for all that Loki has been through, for _everything_. Though Loki had only sneered and told him to go to Hel.

But there is so much Thor wants to know. What had happened when Loki had fallen from the Bifrost? Where had he gone, and how had he come to be under that creature’s spell? 

What had happened on Svartalfheim? Loki has said he felt the blade pierce his chest; how had he survived? 

Why try to usurp their father? Anger, revenge, simple trickery on principle? 

And gods… Why, _why_ had Loki let go on the Bifrost? Why had he allowed himself to fall? Does he not know that Thor would have held on until the end of times, would have fallen himself before he let Loki go? 

_I have walked amongst the dead_, Loki has said. What does that mean, Thor wonders. Where has Loki been? What has Loki done? When he vacantly stares at the walls, somehow both here and not all at once, what does he see?

Thor wants to know so many things, but he holds his tongue. Deep down, he’s selfish, and he’d rather keep Loki here than to prod old wounds and push Loki away. 

So they go on as they do, false joviality to hide the pain eating them up from the inside.

~*~

Thor gets called away on Avengers business the day after Loki finishes cycling. It’s timing at its very finest. Even if Thor is feeling rather chafed and exhausted, at least Loki is momentarily content.

Thor leaves for New York knowing the Trickster won’t be inclined towards mischief for a few days yet. It’s a lovely reassurance.

But then over a week passes before he is able to return home. It’s not a new arrangement for them; sometimes Thor is gone for upwards of two weeks at a time on missions. Loki seems aware enough of their situation to stay out of any real trouble, but Thor usually returns to the inside of the cabin redecorated with entirely new and all-encompassing illusions. Oftentimes, things are so changed that he doesn’t even recognize the inside of his own home. 

This time, though, he returns to find the cabin as he left it. The lights are off, no candles burnings, and Loki is nowhere in sight.

“Brother?” Thor calls, frowning as he sets Mjolnir down on his weapons rack. There’s no answer.

He checks all of Loki’s usual hideouts first—the back garden, the study, the bedroom—before he finds himself standing in front of the washroom. The door is cracked, a soft light spilling out from inside. He knocks on the doorframe and calls his brother’s name. When he gets no reply, he pushes the door open.

He knows his brother well enough to recognize the aura of his magic; to know the shimmer of it in the air, the feel of it against his skin. It is all around him in their home; normally a reassuring presence, an extension of Loki himself wrapped all around them. Except when Thor steps into the bathroom, there is a sudden pull and heaviness to it all. He thinks he may choke on it.

Loki scowls at Thor from where he’s lounging in their huge, clawfoot bathtub. His hair is wet, slicked back from his face, and he has one leg thrown over the edge, dripping water and soap bubbles onto the floor. “Some privacy, please?” Loki snaps.

“What are you doing?” Thor demands. He strides across the bathroom, touching everything as he goes, trying to find the piece of the puzzle that doesn’t match. Trying to find the thing that will make the room dissolve into the blank wooden walls of the cabin, into the _truth_.

“What do I appear to be doing?” Loki quips, sitting up in the tub. And Thor has the momentary, horrible thought that maybe Loki himself is the lie. That maybe his brother has gone, and he’s only left his illusion behind as consolation.

Except when Thor kneels by the tub and cups Loki’s face in his hands, he’s solid and real. There’s something there in his eyes, though. A look of desperation, hurt, and fear. Thor shakes his head and asks, “What’ve you done?”

“Leave me,” Loki says, voice losing its previous jauntiness and turning hard as steel. 

“Loki,” Thor breathes, confused and worried. “Loki, please. What are you hiding?”

He’s stopped trying to break the illusion when it happens; his hands are just moving of their own accord. He cups the back of Loki’s neck, then moves both hands to Loki’s bare shoulders in a steadying, comforting gesture. His brother is still staring at him with that horrified sort of pain in his eyes when Thor drops his hands into the bathwater.

The room dissolves around them. 

Loki is sitting in the empty, rectangular bathtub dressed in nothing but a loose-fitted tunic. He’s horribly pale, sweating hard, his hair a frizzed mess sticking at his temples. There is blood all over the white enamel bottom of the tub.

Loki tries to scramble away from Thor’s outstretched hands, but he’s walled in by the bathtub and the cabin itself. He winces and grabs for his stomach as he moves, and Thor’s hands immediately reach for him again. 

“You’re injured, Brother,” he says, looking closer. Thor pulls up his brother’s tunic, checking his stomach for wounds, though all his finds is pale, sweaty skin. “What’s happened? Who attacked you?”

Loki laughs, though it’s a mean sound without any humor. “Thor, I said _leave me_!”

And then the pieces begin to fall into place. The blood is all pooled under Loki’s rump, painted between his legs and smeared down the insides of his thighs. It’s coming from inside his womb, not from any sort of injury. And there is too much of it, at least Thor thinks. Too much for this to be the normal bleeding that comes after his cycle. Thor can’t say he knows this for sure, but it certainly _seems_ like too much.

One thing he _does_ know for sure: Loki should be finished with his normal after-cycle bleeding. It’s been over a week. Whatever this is, it’s not normal. 

Though Thor has a feeling he already knows what this is.

“Loki,” Thor murmurs, grabbing his brother by the face. Loki grimaces, though Thor cannot tell whether it’s in anger or in pain. “Loki, tell me that you are not—tell me that you have not…”

“Leave me!” Loki snarls, shoving at Thor. Then, when Thor only rocks back on his heels, “I cannot cope with your idiocy and _this_ at the same time. _Leave!_”

“Loki, tell me, please,” Thor begs, hand curling protectively around Loki’s jaw.

Loki sighs and closes his eyes, looking so very weary. The cracks in his mask have shattered open, and all the hurt underneath is staggering. “What do you wish to hear?” he asks. “That this is not what it looks to be? That I was not with child? That I have not torn it out of myself and smeared it across the bottom of the basin?”

Thor doesn’t know what to say, and he feels as though he breaks apart when Loki turns tired, angry eyes on him. “Was it mine?” Thor murmurs.

“_That_ is what you ask?” Loki barks, leaning toward Thor. “Do you think I would allow any other man near me while I am gripped with that mania? Did you _truly_ think? You utter fool…”

Thor takes a deep breath, then lets it out long and slow. His mind feels as though it’s running around in circles, a million things to say sitting on the tip of his tongue but no one full thought to express what he’s feeling. The room smells like blood.

“Leave,” Loki repeats for the nth time.

“You should have come to me,” Thor says. “We are family. I would have…”

“Would have _what_, Thor?” Loki snaps. “You’re right, we _are_ family. I carried my brother’s bastard child. It is _always_ my brother’s bastard child. So what would you have me do?”

“_Always_?” Thor asks, feeling as though his worst suspicions have just been confirmed.

“I just explained to you; you are the only one who has had me in this way,” Loki says, then shakes it head. “What other men do you think have put a child in me?”

“Loki…” Thor breathes. And there must be something on his face or in the tone of his voice, because Thor watches Loki begin reassembling his walls right before his eyes. Thor reaches out for him again and begs, “Brother, you do not have to do this.”

“Oh, but I do, _Brother_,” Loki replies, spitting the familial term like venom. 

“Loki, we’re not…” Thor begins, then stops himself. Because that’s not true: they _are_. But… “We are brothers, yes, but not by blood. The babe would not be spoiled by our actions.”

“Listen to yourself,” Loki says, laughing. “I do not know whether to accuse you of being fine or foul.”

“It is just truth,” Thor says. “You do not have to put yourself through this.”

“It matters not,” Loki says. “It’s too late.”

_Too late…_ Thor’s eyes drop to the blood at the bottom of the tub. He’d already known, he supposes, but to hear it actually spoken aloud; to stare at the streaked red and think of what could have come to pass, of his child, of _their_ child…

“Leave me,” Loki says again, breaking the quiet. “You’ve said enough, now leave.”

Thor remains kneeling by the tub, hands gripping the edge. 

“I said _leave_, Thor!” Loki repeats, angry.

“No,” Thor decides. “No, I will not leave you here like this. You do not deserve to suffer alone.”

There is a moment of weighted silence before Loki lunges, grabbing Thor’s wrist up like a vice. Thor doesn’t register the pain immediately; doesn’t register the freezing burn until after the pale white of Loki’s hand has begun to melt to blue, until after the green of his eyes has bled into rubies. Loki shrieks at him nonsensically, wordless, full of pain and anger. 

Thor stands and stumbles back, staring down at his arm. Loki’s handprint is there branded in frostbite, cold and aching. 

The rightful King of Jotunheim, indeed.

When Thor looks back up, he’s standing in an empty room, all marble floors and gilded walls, no bath or blood or brother in sight.

And when he screams Loki’s name, the sound of his voice just echoes off the walls.

~*~

A day passes, then another, and then another. Thor keeps expecting Loki to simply reappear; keeps expecting to turn around and find his brother there next to him. Thor will try to talk to him, and Loki will smile and jest and press on as though nothing has happened. Because if Loki is good at anything, it’s repression with a smile.

But then weeks pass, and nothing. 

Thor begins to think that perhaps this is it. He’s stepped into the middle something he shouldn’t have, or at least something that Loki wasn’t ready for, and now he’s suffering the consequences. When will Loki return? Will he be back in three months’ time to repeat their warped dance? Or is this another chapter come to a close?

He’s lost his brother so many times, and though this time it’s to something other than death, he’s still lost him again all the same.

But then it’s February, a chill still hanging heavy in the air, and Loki reappears.

Thor wakes to find his brother in the sitting room perched in his armchair as though he never left. Loki looks over at him with sharp eyes, long fingers wrapped around a steaming mug, before he turns away, seemingly disinterested. 

Thor sighs before walking past into the kitchen. 

Loki speaks up while Thor is pouring himself a cup of coffee; it’s so quiet, Thor almost misses it. “I do what I have to do in this life. You can’t hold that against me.”

And he should leave it, Thor knows. He should just nod and be glad his brother is home. However, he says, “Is that what you tell yourself, Brother? Is that how you justify everything that’s happened?”

Thor expects pushback for that, but he gets no reply. He half-expects that he’s run Loki off again, but when he takes his coffee out into the sitting room, he finds Loki still sitting in his armchair. So Thor settles in as well, giving his brother a once over. Loki looks to be well; at least Thor can take heart in that.

“I am glad you’ve returned,” Thor offers.

There’s a beat of quiet. Loki takes a sip from his mug, outwardly ignoring Thor, then says, “When I awoke, there was nothing.”

Thor frowns. “Pardon?”

Finally, Loki meets Thor’s gaze. “That hateful creature took hold of me, choked me, and then there was nothing. _Nothing_.”

Thor takes a deep breath, then lets it out slowly. “Hel?” he guesses.

But Loki shakes his head. “I am unsure. I believe it was some type of limbo, like the Midgardians speak of their Purgatory,” he says. “It matters not what you call it. It was vast and beyond understanding.”

“So you passed on to a vast realm of limbo. One that was beyond your understanding,” Thor clarifies, brows raised. “And yet now you stand before me.”

“Mmm,” Loki hums, nodding. “It is—I still do not understand it. There was nothing, but then there was _something_. It spoke to me, though it did not have a voice…”

“You tell fine stories,” Thor comments, interrupting. 

Loki narrows his eyes but continues without arguing. “I understood what was said, but I saw no creature. There was no form, no existence; it was all empty. And once it was finished with me, I returned to my body being flung to Midgard.”

Thor’s unsure what to say in reply, so he remains silent.

“You’ve asked me several times about my death,” Loki says eventually, once the quiet has stretched on too long. “So this is my honesty, my peace offering to you.”

Thor chuckles, because it is just such a _Loki_ thing to say. Only his brother would think in such ways, that one truth should make up for another hundred different lies. “And I suppose the voice, or the non-voice as it were… It told you that it was not your time to die?” Thor asks.

Loki smirks. “Something of the sort, yes.”

“How very cliché, Brother,” Thor says. “I expect better narratives from you.”

Loki sneers at him. “Do you truly wish to know what it told me?” he asks. “You may not like the words.”

“Of course I wish to know,” Thor says.

“It said that if it allowed me rest, Asgard would fall,” Loki replies.

“Asgard has already fallen,” Thor points out.

“I argued this point as well,” Loki admits. “I was told that Asgard is not a place but a people. I felt a sense of deja vu then; I believe someone in this room once said those very words.”

Thor grunts, shaking his head. “And so what, you have come back to be the savior of our people? Our humble group of fishermen who need no saving? There is a reason I left them with the Valkyrie as their Queen.”

“Cowardice?” Loki guesses, and Thor wants to smack the look of condescension off his pretty face.

“Good sense,” Thor corrects. “They are trying to move on, to live simple happy lives. I cannot be their ruler; the weight of my pain and anger is too great.”

“And the Valkyrie’s pain is less than yours? Her anger is less?” Loki asks, then laughs. “You are a fool.”

Thor swallows back his response to that, instead points out, “It sounds as though you have returned once again desiring a throne.”

Loki scoffs. “If so, then why am I sitting in your tawdry little cabin? Surely I should be working my wiles in New Asgard.”

“I cannot say I always understand your motives, Brother,” Thor says.

Loki smirks, then shakes his head. “I never wanted the throne. I believe I was explicit about that.”

“Yet you went through a great deal of trouble to conquer Midgard,” Thor says, though as soon as the words are out of his mouth, he knows they are unfair. “That was—I am sorry. I know that you were not yourself, then.”

Loki lets the comment slide, an uncharacteristic show of good will. 

Silence settles between them, a bit tense but still peaceable. Thor drinks his coffee, while Loki relaxes into his chair, tilting his head back and closing his eyes. It’s quite some time before he speaks up again.

“We are quite a pair,” Loki says. “The rightful kings of Asgard and Jotunheim. Rulers of ruined kingdoms and extinct peoples. Someone will surely come soon to crown us the kings of naught.”

“Then why return?” Thor counters.

“I just told you,” Loki says with a tired sigh. “I was not permitted to stay. I would have happily passed on to Hel; I wanted to be through with this, I am so _tired_. But I was thrown to Midgard instead.”

And those are words Thor wishes he could go back and unhear. _I would have happily passed on to Hel; I wanted to be through with this. _ He echoes his brother’s sigh and asks, “But why return here? To my ‘tawdry cabin’?”

“Perhaps I wished for some modicum of familiarity. Somewhere safe to rest,” Loki says, grinning crookedly. “Is that so difficult to believe?”

“Centuries ago, I would have _known_ that was why you were here,” Thor says. “But now, I feel as though I know nothing of you.”

“I am not as complex as you make me out to be,” Loki replies.

“It is not complexity,” Thor tells him. “It is duplicity.”

“I am being honest,” he says, meeting Thor’s gaze with an open vulnerability Thor isn’t used to seeing on him. “All I wish for now is some security and closeness. Allow me that, and I will remain peacefully by your side for millennia to come.”

“I do not think that the word ‘peaceful’ is in your vocabulary, Brother,” Thor says, though the look on Loki’s face is breaking him wide open. He shakes his head and adds, “Regardless, what do you plan to do regarding the ‘fall of Asgard’? If it indeed does rest all on your shoulders.”

“Prevention,” Loki answers simply. “I do not plan on carrying this burden.”

“And how to you plan on preventing some sort of vague prophecy?” Thor asks.

Loki shrugs. “There is already a Valkyrie sitting on the throne and a blood heir ahead of me in line. I assume if I can keep you both alive, this responsibility won’t fall on my head.”

“So your entire plan is to keep me alive in case tragedy befalls the Valkyrie?” Thor asks, scowling. “That is…”

“No,” Loki interrupts. “I plan to keep _her_ alive. Before I ever traveled here to you, I spent weeks weaving my magic around her and into that town. The people have my full protection, and if she so much as stubs her toe, I know about it.”

“Oh,” Thor replies, at a loss for words.

“Do I still manage to surprise you, Brother?” Loki asks, grinning. “That is good to know.”

Thor grins in return, something warm and easy like affection curling in his belly. How is Loki the only one alive who can do this to him? He can have him fuming with anger, or bitter with distrust, or gutted with betrayal; but then Loki lowers his walls just the tiniest bit, gives him a half-inch, and Thor folds like the cheapest of linens.

But then Loki has always been his highest of highs and his lowest of lows.

“You should be in New Asgard, then,” Thor points out. “Not that I wish you to leave me. But if you truly want to protect the people and the Valkyrie…”

“I can spell myself there within minutes,” Loki says with a shrug. “Anyway, I doubt I would be welcomed, considering everything that has transpired.”

Thor frowns. His brother may have a point.

“So I shall stay here and endeavor to keep you breathing as well,” Loki says. “In the event that my true plan fails, then at least the crown will fall to you, not me.”

“My life has such meaning to you. Just a head to rest a crown on,” Thor says, though he grins in jest. Loki rolls his eyes.

“Do stop. You are not as humorous as you think,” Loki says. Despite his words, he chuckles, then takes a sip from his mug. Thor follows suit; his coffee is going cold. Eventually, Loki speaks up again. “The prophecy—or at least the thing’s sentiment, whatever it was—it was ambiguous. Perhaps this was all it meant. That I am needed to offer protection; that my magic would be needed.”

“You just assumed it meant that the crown would fall to you,” Thor observes. “King Loki.”

“Do not give me that title,” Loki says, wrinkling his nose. But then he sighs, admitting, “Yes, I did assume.”

“Is this where I accuse you of having delusions of grandeur?” Thor asks, brow raised.

“Do so, and I will drive a kitchen knife into your good eye over dinner,” Loki says.

Thor laughs. “What happened to keeping me healthy should I have to ascend the throne?”

“I will keep you _breathing_. I said nothing of keeping you healthy,” Loki says, smirking. He stands then, mug held in one hand while he smooths down his tunic with his free hand. “I will be in the garden if you need me further,” he says. “I am sure there is a lot of work to be done. I’ve been quite neglectful this past month.”

“You’ve been gone this past month,” Thor corrects.

Loki only hums in vague acknowledgment as he disappears around the corner and into the kitchen.

“You needn’t have left,” Thor says. Then, because the words are easier to say when Loki is out of sight, when he doesn’t have to look into Loki’s eyes, “I was angry at your lies. But I don’t blame you for your actions; you did what you thought was necessary.”

There’s an indignant expression on Loki’s face when he returns from the kitchen. “Not what I _thought_ was necessary,” Loki says. “It _was_ necessary; is _always_ necessary.”

Pain twists in Thor’s gut. “Loki…” he murmurs.

“I do not wish to speak of this further,” Loki says, striding purposely toward the back and out to the garden. The conversation is effectively ended.

Thor sighs, looking down into his coffee, and says to the empty room, “I wish to speak about it.”

No one answers him.

~*~

Thor bites his tongue. He has learned the hard way that if Loki does not wish to speak about something, pressing him about the subject will usually result in violence. And so they return to some degree of normalcy; at least as normal as their lives ever are.

Then Thor wakes in the middle of the night to a flailing body next to him in the bed, soft whimpers and cries echoing in the dark. When Thor reaches out, Loki’s body is ice cold even through the silky fabric of his sleep shirt. It’s difficult to tell in the dim light of the bedroom, but he thinks Loki’s glamour may have faded away amidst his nightmare. The Aesir skin is more fickle now that it’s driven my Loki’s own magic, now that Odin has passed away. It seems prone to this—shifting in the middle of the night while Loki sleeps.

Thor squeezes Loki’s shoulder and shakes him gently. “Loki, wake up,” he hisses. “Loki, it’s a nightmare. Wake up, it’s not real.”

This is not new, not for either of them. Sometimes Thor will wake from his terrors to Loki’s hand on his arm, an unusually gentle expression on his brother’s lovely face, and Thor will rise from the bed so as not to disturb Loki further. Though when it’s Thor waking Loki, Thor has to be careful of Loki’s kneejerk violent reaction. His brother always awakens from his nightmares fighting, and then once he calms, he flees into the bathroom or outside into the night to hide.

And so Thor is ready when Loki lunges at him out of his dreams, that familiar look of confusion and fear in his ruby-red eyes. Thor shoves him back down onto the bed with a hand in the middle of his chest, then braces himself for whatever panicked reaction Loki will have to that.

Thor grimaces as the ice spreads from Loki’s body, encasing the bed underneath them both and trapping Thor’s knees and shins to the mattress. Frostbite begins to climb up the hand holding Loki to the bed, and fear begins to weave its way into Thor’s stomach. Loki normally fights in the night with his fists, feet, and the occasional summoned dagger. He has never turned his magic on Thor, much less the ice of his Jӧtnar form. 

This is it, Thor thinks. After everything, after all they have survived, this is how he is going to die; inadvertently frozen to death amidst his brother’s terror. 

But then Loki reels back, flinging himself from the bed. Thor watches, panting, while Loki stares back from the side of the bed, ruby-red eyes reflecting the moonlight coming in through the window. Everything is impossibly still, save for the throbbing of Thor’s blackened forearm.

“Loki?” Thor murmurs, once the seconds have ticked by with no movement or words. The bed is still frozen over, the sheets stiff and cold against Thor’s skin. The very air feels as thought it holds the ice of Jotunheim.

Loki seems to choke on his breath—or perhaps he’s choking on a sob, a scream. It’s difficult to tell. 

“You can speak to me,” Thor offers. He hopes Loki already knows this, but recent events have made Thor wonder. “You needn’t hide or keep your secrets here. You are my brother, and you will always have my love.”

Loki hiccups out a laugh, though it’s an unamused noise, tears clinging in the corners of his eyes. 

“Loki…” Thor murmurs again, unsure what to say further.

“I am afraid, Brother,” Loki declares. “You make me want for things that I shouldn’t—things that are neither sensible nor honorable.”

“Are you referring to…” Thor trails off, swallowing. “Are you referring to what I think you are referring to?”

“What else would I be referring to?” Loki hisses.

“So then this is the only time we are allowed to speak of it?” Thor asks, finding himself unexplainably irritated. “When the sky is dark and you wear blue skin and I lay on a frozen bed?”

Loki swallows, the apple of his throat bobbing, and looks away. “You treat me as you do,” he says. “And you say such maddening things.”

“What have I said to anger you, Brother?” Thor asks.

Loki shakes his head. “It is just that you make me wonder what could have happened if things had been different.”

“_If_s and _could_s do not help,” Thor tells him. “I have learned this over time.”

“If I had been allowed to be a Jӧtun,” Loki presses on. “Taken and raised as your concubine or consort…”

“That is what you wish for?” Thor asks, disbelieving. “To be my _concubine_?”

“I prefer the title of Consort. I would have sat beside the throne as your equal, then. And I could have given you an heir and an army of spares by now,” Loki says. “But either way, we could have been together without guilt.”

“I…” Thor begins, then trails off. He’s honestly unsure how to react. Finally, he says, “You’ve thought about this a great deal.”

“More than is healthy. Enough to find me insane with it,” Loki answers, before huffing a sigh. He takes a step toward the bed, extending a hand, and says, “Here, I’ve hurt you.”

Thor surrenders his frostbitten forearm, only slightly surprised at the cool feel of restorative magic. He’s never seen Loki heal; but then Mother had been able to cure all sorts of ailments, and Loki had learned all his talents from her. He’s silent as he watches Loki work his magic, and then when Loki pulls away, he says, “I love you, Loki—both as a brother should and as a brother should not. Though I believe you already know this.”

Loki shoots him a grin, weak and crooked. “No, it needs not be spoken.”

“You think most things need not be spoken,” Thor points out. “Perhaps that is why we are here.”

Loki looks down to the floor. Silence settles.

“Just tell me one thing,” Thor says. His heart hammers in his chest, while the air still chills his skin. “How many heirs would I have?”

“I believe a king can only have one heir,” Loki dodges. “That is the _point_ of having an heir; only one child is destined to inherit the throne.”

“Then how many spares?” Thor presses.

Loki shakes his head, closing his eyes. He waves his hand in a lazy gesture—the ice melts and the bed dries under Thor—and then turns to leave the bedroom. Thor watches the blue of his hands fade back into soft cream. He assumes Loki is putting an end to the conversation, is refusing to answer, but then Loki pauses in the bedroom doorway.

“Loki?” Thor murmurs, quiet.

Loki lays a hand on the doorframe and says, “I do not know how many, Thor. I stopped counting eventually.”

Thor’s stomach ends up in his throat, and his heart ends up on the floor. He opens his mouth, a million questions on the tip of his tongue. _Was there nothing else you could have done? Did you not try using prophylactics? What about your magic?_

And most of all: _Why didn’t you come to **me**?_

However, Loki leaves through the bedroom door before Thor can question him further. Thor calls after him but Loki doesn’t reply, and Thor knows better than to follow him in a time like this. 

Thor is left sitting up in bed and staring at the empty space where Loki had just stood, wondering how his brother is still clinging to the thread of sanity he has left. 

In the same circumstances, Thor is not sure that he would manage. 

**Author's Note:**

> Comments and kudos are much loved <3


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